So today was our first day with our new bus mates and the saying, 'Better the devil you know,' couldn’t have been more apt. We thought we were unlucky with some of the first group (the Hobbit springs to mind)... we couldn’t have been more wrong. If we hadn’t have known better we would suspect it was a social experiment to see how fast we would kill each other. Fortunately there were no deaths over breakfast but it was a close call.

The morning went with a bang when Annabelle woke up with excruciating pain in her newly created root canal ... it didn’t stop her eating a smoked salmon bagel, but chewing was a slow, careful process. Over breakfast we were given our hiking options for the day, after much deliberation (about 3 ½ minutes) we decided to take the El Capitain Loop Trail – which should have taken us about 4 hours.

Off we headed with our lunch and water ready for some natural excitement

. What followed wasn’t excitement – more like pain. After a very adventurous hike to Lower Yosemite Falls, that involved clambering over rocks, we headed off to our main hike for the day. It took us a while to find the trailhead, so that dampened our spirits slightly, but at 1 ½ hours in, when we couldn’t work out which direction to go, Annabelle threw a strop (so unlike her) and we got the park shuttle bus back to the Lodge. The section of the trail we did complete was rather uneventful compared to our past efforts, but we did see El Capitain which is a rock climbers Mecca (meant to be one of the hardest and best places to climb in the world) and a mule deer walked out just 20 metres in front of us.

On our return to the Lodge we found exactly what we were looking for ... a swimming pool. But not just any swimming pool, one surrounded by the mountains of Yosemite. This actually suited us down to the ground – lazing around but because we could see the mountains we felt were making an effort to take in our surroundings. Our warped logic made us feel better about being lazy. We had lovely few hours relaxing and the whole experience was made better by the fact Annabelle walked in without paying – two swims for $5, bargain!

After a very average dinner we stopped off at a point in the park where you could see the main attractions of the Valley; Half Dome, El Capitain, Sentinel Rock, Horsetail Fall, Clouds Rest, Cathedral Rocks and Bridalveil Fall. We then had a 4 hour drive to our campsite which turned out to be in the woods in the middle of nowhere. We only had one wee stop en route and struggled to find our way through the dark to some more smelly toilets, the only bonus being that the stars were incredibly bright, like a canvas! When we arrived in the pitch black at 11pm, we took the executive decision to sleep on the bus rather than set up our tent, so on the back platform we dove for what we hoped would be a great nights’ sleep.